1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates generally to heat sinks for semiconductor chips and, more particularly, to a semiconductor chip and heat spreading structure to efficiently conduct away the heat generated by the semiconductor chip.
2. Description of the Related Art
Electronic devices and systems, such as computers, consist of semiconductor chips containing integrated circuits and other electronic components, which are mounted on a substrate. With the demand for higher levels of integration in semiconductor chips, more and more circuits are incorporated in the semiconductor chips. This higher level of integration coupled with a reduction in the dimensions of the device or transistor of the integrated circuit produces a semiconductor chip which generates a substantial amount of heat during operation. In addition, the transistors of the integrated circuit are being fabricated to operate faster which further increases the amount of heat generated during operation. One known technique for assisting in reducing heat generated by integrated circuits with the same power during operation of the semiconductor chip is to form a high conductivity layer, such as silicon carbide and diamond, on or adjacent the back of the chip.
However, in scaling down the device size, with advances in lithographic techniques, to increase the number of integrated circuits requires that such a chip contain both low power and high power circuits. Because of this requirement, the heat generated across such a chip is not uniform since the high power circuits generate more heat than the low power circuits and create "hot spots" in the chip. These localized "hot-spots" in the chips result in a non-uniform temperature across the chip which causes excessive chip stresses and can lead to chip failure.
Consequently, there exits a need for thermal solutions that limits the maximum chip temperature and provides an uniform chip temperature across the high/low power integrated circuit chip areas to prevent excessive chip stresses. Therefore, it is an object of the present invention to provide a highly reliable thermal chip structure and process for fabricating such a structure which eliminates hot spots across the chip area. A further object of the present invention is to provide a thermal structure and process for maintaining a more uniform chip temperature across the chip area.